Nikon D3300 replacement rumored to be announced this year (D3500?)

The Nikon D3300 camera is rumored to be replaced in 2016. I do not have an exact date, but there is a very good chance that the next camera announcement could be the D3500 (or D3400?). The new camera will be compatible with SnapBridge and is expected to have a 24MP sensor - this is all I have for now.

I have a d5500 and it lists snapbridge ON THE BOX as a feature – which it clearly is not.

CaMeRa QuEsT

That’s what happens when the marketing department doesn’t know what the development department is doing.

BrainBeat

If Snapbridge is as good as we would hope it is I could see a place for cheaper cameras like this actually selling very well. Sure the current WiFi offering is ok these improvements should make it more easy to access photos near instantly for consumers.

Max

yes, this is the camera that Snapbridge will be the most important for.

HotDuckZ

D3300s

Eric Calabros

Just ask about the mirror. Its answer is the most important thing your sources are supposed to give us

MonkeySpanner

Agreed. This is the major point. If this new body is mirrorless this could be huge. I would greatly prefer an f mount body with good ergonomics to a soap bar a6300.

Muhammed

I wonder if the 39pt AF from the D5200/D5300/D5500 will trickle down. Also would like to see a smaller body. I doubt Nikon will get rid of the mirror, although might be interesting if they did.

They wouldn’t kill one of the main differences between the D5500 and D3300.

Jeffry De Meyer

they could just kill the 5xxx line, Nikon is selling to many products with little differentiation.

Tieu Ngao

I agree. For APS-C there shouldn’t be more than 3 models: 3500, 7200, and 500.
For 3xxx model it could be very interesting to have 2 versions: mirror and mirrorless for now before discontinuing the mirror one.

TylerChappell

Considering the various price points, it makes perfect sense for there to be 4 DX models and not just 3. Image quality may be nearly identical in all of them, but the D5500 is vastly different than a D3300, and the D7200 is vastly different from the D5500, and the D500 is still a whole different beast from the D7200.
$400-$450
$600-$750
$1200
and $2000 are all very different price points and there’s plenty of room for all of them.

Allen_Wentz

The twist/swivel display is huge value add to D5xxx. Yet it makes sense to also have a cheaper minimalist D3xxx. Perhaps either dump D5xxx and put the tilt/swivel on the D7xxx or just dump D7xxx now that D500 is here.

HD10

If
the new model will be mirrorless and utilize the same Sony sensor used
in the Sony A6300, the new mirrorless DX will have OSPDAF and will
likely have far more than the 51 points AF points of the D7200. The recent earthquake in Kumamoto however disrupted Sony’s sensor production and may have
an impact on its ability to supply Nikon with the sensor for this new
mirrorless camera.

One offshot if the new Nikon DX will be
mirrorless is that the viewfinder will have a substantially larger
magnification than even the recently released D500. So on both AF points and viewfinder, the new DX camera will be quite an improvement over current DX models.

Add to this the significantly higher battery capacity of Nikon (compared to Sony), better camera controls, and greater lens options (specially from 3rd party lens manufacturers) – all these will make the new mirrorless Nikon DX cameras more appealing to the enthusiast market. The new mirrorless DX should also appeal to Nikon as it will have a lower cost per unit.

The recent news and rumors of VR-less kit lens in DX and FX format suggest that Nikon will likely release mirrorless DX and FX. Its about time Nikon.

Max

I agree with most of that, but I think the af module in the D3300, using single/center af point can still acquire focus faster than the A6000, and probably any mirrorless camera.

Jim Huang

I do agree with you.
I have compared the AF speed between A6300 and my D3200. I do feel dSLR still has an edge, especially tracking. However, I couldn’t make the comparison completely fair has the lenses I put on them are different.

Max

Interesting. I’d like to do such a test myself.

Jim Huang

Let us know the results. 🙂

Max

Unfortunately I own neither!

Allen_Wentz

The D3200 costs 1/3 what the A6300 costs so direct comparisons are a bit unfair.

Jim Huang

Yeah, as I said, the comparison wasn’t fair. My point is that the 2012 entry level DSLR (centre focus point with good lens) can focus faster than modern mirrorless camera with an average lens. I believe the difference is more on the lens than the camera.

You may say, but Jim “this test is pointless”, and it sort of is. There is no way I could make them the same.

MonkeySpanner

Maybe single center point, yes. But mirrorless does this neat little trick with face recognition where it both focuses on and exposes for faces. To me that is infinitely more useful than thousandths of a second difference in focus acquisition.

Max

I know, but personally that would drive me crazy as the kind of photography I do gives me very little time to focus and the subjects move and are unpredictable.. I think you may find that in dim light the difference is more than such a tiny fraction of a second.

MonkeySpanner

Many times my subjects are like yours. And yes, single center point on DSLR is very useful. But it requires workarounds for exposure (if for example your subject is wearing a dark shirt). Not a huge problem, but the ml implementation of face detect is better in good light (just my opinion).

Lulek

Hi, Admin! I remember that about a year ago there were some rumours about a “D2300” with an EVF. Given the small and dim OVF the D3x00 and D5x00 have, I was expecting for it to use some Voigtländer manual focus pancakes when I don’t want to carry the D610. Any news on that front? I guess it makes more sense to just swap the viewfinder type in the D3x00 series than to commercialize a new line.

Nikon makes a mirrorless line. I would not expect a DSLR to suddenly become mirrorless.

Just enjoy your purchase.

MonkeySpanner

Yes, Nikon has a 1″ mirrorless system that they have not supported well with interesting lenses.
And, its not just the AF that is bad on DSLR – it is the clunky gymnastics and mirror flipping that occurs when you do press the shutter button. It all just seems so backwards compared to the slick integration of say an a6000.
So, if Nikon could produce a mirrorless with similar AF characteristics of the 1″, but in f mount with a body size of the d3300 – I would be onboard with that. Heck, I think it is what all the mirrorless community is waiting for as well. All the other mirrorless systems have gone too small in my opinion. I think Samsung had it just about right with the nx1, but then went too high end with it.

Justtakethepicture

Let’s hope they finally get a clue and make it mirrorless with an EVF. For me, one of the biggest drawbacks of budget APS-C DSLR’s are their poor OVF’s. Seems to me the best place to start with mirrorless would be in their budget models. I doubt the people buying them would care if they had EVF’s, and they would finally answer many of their critics who think they are leaving it too long to take mirrorless seriously.

MonkeySpanner

For me the biggest downside of DSLR is the clumsy implementation of live view and how the camera behaves differently in live view than non-LV. That and Nikon LV AF is pretty much unusable. I was on the precipice of a a6000, but decided to stick with Nikon DSLR a little longer in the hopes than an f mount ML is coming.

KnightPhoto

Isn’t the D810 LV pretty decent now (and the D5/D500)?

MonkeySpanner

Not sure, don’t have those bodies. But, after you have used a good mirrorless system the DSLR live view just seems clunky. And no focus peaking – seriously? With all the great manual lenses for f mount! How could this be?

KnightPhoto

Would like to see optional EVF’s available for all our Nikon DSLRs – would be very handy. For me that alone is one huge advantage for Mirrorless. If I had that as an optional add-on for my DSLRs, much less reason in my case to need Mirrorless.

Nikon, if you are listening, can you please wait until you come up with something really good before continually ‘upgrading’ these base model cameras? Honestly, how much different is it going to be from the D3100, D3200 and D3300?

I think you need to be a bit more like Apple. Less products, better products with real new benefits. More time between models, not less. That is the way of the future. That way you can save money with development and also state that it is better for the environment (win-win).

Also, I think you need to start making your base model camera bodies out of corn starch plastic and PLA so that they are more eco. How are all these camera model updates good for the environment? The fact is, they are not at all good for the environment. how about inventing biodegradeable circuitboards and more ecological sensors?? Why not invest in that tech? I think people have had enough of the Megapixel race. Time to get more eco with electronic devices now.

Totally agree. One of the best things Apple did was to simply their product line. Having fewer products, but each product best-in-class. Nikon unfortunately has been the Dell/HP of the camera world. How many PC laptop models can a brand make? Many apparently.

I own a D3300 and a D7200, and often will grab the D3300 just because it’s much more simple to set up and use, and lighter. Nikon has a great opportunity to focus its DX line depending on user needs. I never wanted a camera in the D5XXX series because the only differentiating factor I could see was the tilt screen, which I could only imagine breaking easily. I can see the use case…especially filming or shooting skateboarding with a fisheye, but other than that…the DX line is really watered down. The two low-end DX models are really similar as are the two high end DX models. And last I checked they’re still selling at least two versions of each camera in the line (D7200, D7100, D5500, D5300, etc.) Overkill.

I will say that the advances from each D3XXX model to the next have been nice. When you’ve used a D3300 for a while, and then borrow a D3100, you notice the differences… at least I do, especially in IQ and noise handling.

Definitely don’t need more throw-away tech in this world though…build for quality, release less often, and make that money back filling the DX lens gaps.

HD10

I wonder whether Nikon will use the same 20.9mp sensor as used on the D500 if the D3300 replacement were to be a dSLR. The higher sales volume of the D3300 will help to bring down the unit cost of this 20.9mp sensor.

Shutterbug

I don’t think so. The D3xxx-class is the one where people care about how many MP a cam has.

MonkeySpanner

Probably not. Small and high end are mutually exclusive for Nikon. I wish they did make a small DSLR that was loaded up like the d7200 – but no chance of that.

Max

I’m sure it won’t, but get your point. The D3200 had the first 24Mpx sensor, then carried to the other cameras.